aliteraturereviewonmentallexicon.docx
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aliteraturereviewonmentallexicon.docx
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aliteraturereviewonmentallexicon
ALiteratureReviewonMentalLexiconTheory
TheNotionofMentalLexicon
Mentallexicon,alsocalledmentaldictionary,internallexiconorsubjectivelexicon,canbetracedbacktoTreisman(242-48).AccordingtoTreisman(ibid),mentallexiconcanbedefinedasarepositoryofalltheinformationareaderorlistenerhasattainedaboutwordsofhislanguage.Thereisalwaysawell-organizedsystemoflexicalrepresentationineveryspeaker’smind.Uptillnow,theissueofmentallexiconstudieshasarousedgreatconcernamonglinguists,psychologistsaswellasanthropologistshomeandabroad.Differentscholarshavegivendifferentdefinitionstothisterm.Carrol(101-25)interpretsitastheorganizationofwordknowledgeinpermanentmemory.InLevelt’swords,mentallexiconisarepositoryofdeclarativeknowledgeaboutthewordsofhislangue(qtd.inCarrol100),whichisrathersimilartotheonegivenbyTreisman(ibid).Inaword,mentallexicontendstobeviewedasacombinationofbothlexicalknowledgeandworldknowledgesysteminourmind.
Wordscannotbeheapeduprandomlyinthemindfortworeasons.First,therearesomanyofthem,second,theycanbefoundsofast.Psychologistshaveshownthathumanmemoryisbothflexibleandextendable,providedthattheinformationisstructured.Randomfactsandfigureareextremelytoremember,butenormousquantitiesofdatacanberememberedandutilized,aslongastheyarewellorganized.(Aitchison,1993).
Mentallexiconisamentalsystemcontainingalltheinformationaboutwords,suchasthewords’morphologicalknowledge(theword’sstructure),phonologicalinformation(theword’spronunciation),semanticinformation(theword’smeanings),andpartofspeechoftheword(syntacticknowledge).Allthecomprehensiveinformationmakesupalexicalentrystoredinhumanbrainpermanently.Thereisnoprecisecalculationabouthowmanywordsarememorizedinhumanbrain,becausethewordsarestoredinvirtualspace,intangibleandinvisible,unliketangibleobjectssuchasdictionary.Aitchison(1987)claimedthataneducatedEnglishspeakercanmasteratleast50,000words,orashighas250,000words.Thementallexicontheoryisattractingmoreandmoreconcernsfromlinguists,psychologists,withfurtherresearchbeingcarriedon,andnewmodelsareproposedbylinguiststryingtoillustratethemechanism.
Thekeyissuesindealingwiththementallexiconarespecifiedwithintwoquestions:
howwestorewordsinourminds,andhowweretrievethemfromthisdepositorywhenweneedthem.Whenwelearnanewword,thewordismemorizedinternally,whenwereadorlisten,onlywhenthewordissuccessfullyretrieved,canweunderstandthemeaning.Aitchisondrawsananalogybetweenwordsandcoins,withmeaningandwordclassontheonesideandsoundontheother.Sheproposesthatwordlemma(meaningandclass)seemstobeorganizedprimarilyinawaywhichhelpsspeechplanning.Wordforms(soundstructure),ontheotherhand,areorganizedinthewaythatsimilarsoundingwordscloselylinked.Inaword,thementallexiconisstoredbasedoncognitioneconomyandproductionconvenience.
OrganizationofMentalLexicon
HowarewordsinourmentallexiconorganizedAccordingtosomerecentestimates,thevocabularyofaverageeducatedspeakerisabout20,000words,andchildrenacquirewordsatarateofabout1’000wordsperyear.(Nagy,2002).Ifallofthesewordswereaheapofjunk,wewouldnotbeabletofindthewordsweneedefficiently.Butthefactisthatpeoplecanretrievethewordssofastandwithmucheaseinmostcases.Thelargenumberofwordsinthementallexiconandthespeechofword-retrievalindicatethatitmustbehighlywellorganized.
SemanticOrganizationvs.PhonologicalOrganization
Thebiggestproblemwiththestudyofthementallexiconisthatwecannotenterahumanbrainandhavealookatwhatisgoingonthere.Whatwecandoistoobservethatpeopledoorfailtodoinnormalspeechandfromthisobservationbuildamodelthatcapturesasmanyfeaturesofhumanbrainaspossible.Forexample,linguistshavecollectedandanalyzedslipsofthetongueorthetip-of-the-tongue(TOT)phenomenon,whichrevealsomethingabouthuman’smentallexicalorganization.
Theexistenceofbothsemanticerrorsandmalapropisms(phonologicallysimilarspeecherrors)indicatetheexistenceoftwonetworksofmentallexiconorganization:
onesemanticandtheotherphonological.Thatistosay,wordswithrelatedmeaningsarestoredtogetherinasemanticnetworkandwordswithsimilarsoundsarestoredinaphonologicalnetwork.Onlysocanaspeaker,inahurryorinanunthinkingmoment,pickawrongwordthatisnearthetarget:
awrongwordfromthephonologicalnetworkresultsinaphonologicalerrorormalapropismandonefromthesemanticnetworkresultsinasemanticerror.Herearesomefigurestogiveussomeclues.FayandCutler(1977)reportedthat46%ofthe397non-contextuallydeterminedlexicalsubstitutionsintheircorpuswerephonologicallymotivatedsubstitutionsandtheremaining54%involvingtwosemanticallyrelatedwords.Anotherresearcher,Hotopf(1983),reportedasimilarproportionInhisnaturalisticcorpusof232non-contextuallydeterminedlexicalsubstitutions,48%werephonological,and52%weresemantic.
.Inconnectionwiththeorganizationofthementallexicon,thereisaviewthattheremightbetwomentallexicons:
oneforcomprehensionandtheotherforproduction.Inproduction,thedirectionofmappingisfrommeaningtosoundwhileincomprehension,itisfromsoundtomeaning.Thesedifferencesmightsuggest,asChannell(1988)putsit,thatforthementalwordstoretheoptimalarrangementforproductionwillbeaccordingtomeaning,whiletheoptimalarrangementforcomprehensionwillbeaccordingtosound.
Tosumup,theexistenceofmeaningandsoundrelatedsubstitutionsinspeecherrorsandfindingsfromtheTOTresearchindicatethatwordsinthementallexiconmightbeorganizedinsemanticfieldsaswellasinphonologicalfields:
wordsmeaningarerepresentedinasemanticsystemandwordsoundsarerepresentedinaphonologicalsystem.
MentalLexiconOrganizationvs.DictionaryOrganization
Althoughitseemsnaturaltoassumethatmentallexiconresemblesapaperdictionary,infact,therelieingreatdifferencesbetweenthetwo.Firstly,mentallexiconandatraditionalbookdictionaryrelyondifferentrulesandprinciplestoformtheirownstructures.Onepointhasbeengenerallyacceptedthatunlikeapaperdictionary,wordsinmentallexiconarenotstoredinalphabetorder,(Aitchison,2003:
10).Supposewordsinmentallexiconarestoredinalphabeticorder,thenthemistakenwordsmustbenearthetargetword.However,similarmistakenretrievalseldomhappens.Inmentallexicon,thewordsareorganizednotonlyonthebasisofphoneticsandspelling,butalsoonthebasisofwordmeaningorwordsense(Gui,2000:
285).Secondly,bookdictionarycontainsadefinitenumberofwordswithdefiniteliteralmeaningitems;whilementallexiconcomprisesofmuchricherinformation.Forexample,syntactically,abookdictionarycannottellusthatthesentence“Theroadiswide.”isrightbutthesentence“Theroadismain.”iswrong,inspitethat“wide”and“main”havesimilarmeanings(Gui,2000:
252).Thirdly,thelexiconitemsinapaperdictionaryoftenlagbehindtheconstantdevelopmentoflanguage,whereasanyiteminthementallexicondatabaseisincessantlyunderinnovationandcomplementarities,becauseaperson’smindwon’tbefixedwithconstantappearanceordisappearanceofwords,meaningsorevenpronunciations.
LexicalAccesstoMentalLexicon
Lexicalaccesshaslongbeenanimportantsubjectinpsychologists.Theinterpretationoflexicalaccess,accordingtoCarroll(2000:
117),istheprocessbywhichweactivatemeanings.MichaelGarman(2002:
243-248)pointsoutthatthegeneralnatureofthelexiconcanberepresentedascomprisingtwocomponents,storedwordmeaningsandstoredwordforms,togetherwitheachaccesspaththatallowsthesecomponentstocommunicatewitheachother,andwithotherelementsintheprocessinghierarchy.Accordingtohim,accessing“words”forthespeakerorwriterisamatterofmappingideasintothosestoredmeaningrepresentationsinthementallexiconthatareassociatedwithstablewordform,whichcanthenbeusedtoimplementaspokenorwrittenoutput.Whileforthelistenerorreader,themajortaskistomapportionsofthelinguisticsignalontothestoredneurosensorytracesinthementallexicon;onceactivated,thesewillinturnstimulatetheirassociatedmeaningrepresentations.
TherearethreemostrepresentativetheoriesoflexicalaccessbasedonEnglishresearchintheearlyliteratures:
First,thedirectaccesstheory,whichsuggeststhatthemeaningofawordisdirectlyretrievedfromtheformrepresentationduringwhichphonology,hasnofunctionorexertsnoinfluence.Second,thephonologicalmediationtheory,whichholdstheideathatsemanticretrieval,mustbedoneviathemediaofphonology.Thisisaprocessfromlexicalformtophonologicalmarker,andthentothefinalwordmeaning.Thethirddual-routemodelisatheorythatmostresearchershavebeenmorepronetoacceptsince1980.Accordingtothistheory,lexicalprocessingfavorsaparallelprocessingapproachviaboththewordformandphonology(Zhang,1992:
55).However,differentretrievalmethodswillbeappliedtoaccessdifferentwordsdependingonthewordtypes.Asforthehighfrequencywords,theycanbeprocesseddirectlythroughtheformrepresentationwhilethephonologicalmediationisconsideredabackuptunnel.Nowadays,thescholarsgenerallybe
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